Park Life Thursday, Weekend adventures, and Planning Meeting...

We had lovely Thursday on the 16th, spent with the Devon Home-Ed group at Teignmouth.

Teignmouth is a really lovely, quaint seaside town.  It was actually my first introduction to Devon, as it was the town we moved to from Birmingham when I was 12.  Funny how what seemed boring and lacklustre back then is now what makes me think of the town so fondly now.  I love so many things about it - the beautiful seafront, the pier, the beach with its sea wall walk, and now the seafront play park which gives my children so much pleasure.

It was a lovely meeting. Nice adults to chatter to, groups of happy children playing on the equipment, dabbling in the water fountains, and playing what could loosely be termed as Rugby - something which is totally new to footie mad Joe. Joseph also had a lovely offer of a game of crazy golf on the newly (well, new since our last visit) revamped course which he thoroughly enjoyed.  I rather enjoyed the yummy hot-chocolates from the nearby cafe.

I'm really enjoying the group get-togethers at the moment.  It's great to meet other Devon home-edders, so mixing in with other groups is really nice.  There has been talk that once a month we could perhaps have a joint group meeting with other groups in Exeter which I think will really help bring people together and open up new contacts amongst the groups.

If anyone reading this is interested in attending such a meet, the first one is on Tuesday 5th October, contact me on Julia@classroomfree.co.uk for more details.

Our Friday and Saturday was filled with quiet family time.  It seems as if we have been out and about a great deal recently and have almost have social overload :)  But I am loving my life right now (apart from the few glitches with the job situation). 

So on the agenda was blackberry picking, film watching, book reading, baking, rabbit cuddling and a little bit of shopping.  

Sunday was our Not Back to School Picnic.  Sadly the weather wasn't too promising for a beach meet and barbecue and the turnout of families was a little disappointing.  It was a little bit of an anti-climax considering the amount of organising effort that had gone into it (by others, not me!), but there were still smiles on faces so that's the main thing.   For some reason I wasn't feeling in the most sociable of moods so I tended to stay away from the group and spend time alone.  I was happy, there was nothing wrong, just didn't fancy lots of chatter *shrug*.

We were very fortunate with the weather, yes it was dull with grey skies, but the rain held off and a good day (or few hours) was had.  The kids played happily on the beach, and two new members were included into the group immediately, which is always nice to see :)

Sadly our BBQ experience left a lot to be desired, so we cheated and bought other things - I think one family managed a successful cooking session though :)

On Monday we had arranged a group planning meeting for our Teignbridge and Torbay Group.  I won't go into details here, as I'll post over on the group blog a little about the discussion ideas for those members that couldn't make it.